Bicycle Built For Two

Francois Hollande is the driving force behind an international conference to consider the terrible bloodletting in different parts of the Middle East which is a good initiative even if such events have a poor track record of chaining anything on the ground.

But back at home President Hollande is in deep political trouble as he orders a complete overhaul of the French Government which has failed to get to grips with the country's vast mountain of public debt, which puts France at odds with its historical European Union partner, Germany and the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel.  

France's François Hollande returns to mutiny and mistrust within party ranks

The French president faces rebellion from his own Socialist party as he sees his leftwing coalition start to unravel

By Kim Willsher in Paris - The Observer

Singers welcome François Hollande on a visit to the French overseas territory of Mayotte on Friday. Photograph by Alain Jocard/Getty Images

At the news kiosk across the Seine from Rue de Solférino, famed as the home to France's Socialist party, L'Express magazine's front page proclaims from the stands: "La faillite, c'est maintenant."

Faillite is a strong word. It translates as "collapse" or "bankruptcy" and the line plays on President François Hollande's 2012 election slogan: "La change ... c'est maintenant."

In 10 days France will pick up where it left off in July before the long annual down-tools during which the country's woes, if not entirely forgotten, are shelved for sun cream. If the summer weather has been dismal this year, la rentrée – as the collective return to work is known – threatens to be a scorcher for Hollande. The forecast promises protests and political storms amid what analysts say are unprecedentedly gloomy ratings for Hollande and his Socialist government.

A recent survey found that 89% of voters believed it incapable of reducing public debt, as promised; 84% believed it would not improve on the level of zero economic growth, as promised; and 85% did not believe it could reduce unemployment, currently running at a record 10.1%. "This is a massive and indiscriminate lack of trust that symbolises the rejection of the government," said Frédéric Dabi, deputy director general of pollsters Ifop.

It is understandable that 90% of right-wing voters have no confidence in the government; that 58% of Socialist voters have lost faith reveals an opposition within. The "plural" left, the broad coalition of socialists, communists, greens and others that Hollande carried into government, has fragmented.

As the Socialist party gathers for its summer conference in La Rochelle next weekend under the slogan "Let's reinvent ourselves: for France, for the left", the rift between the faithful and the frondeurs (rebels) is widening.

Hours after the prime minister, Manuel Valls, declared a change of direction "out of the question", Cécile Duflot, former leader of the Greens and until this spring a member of Hollande's government, launched a vitriolic attack on her former government colleagues. "To say we'll go 'faster and further' in the same direction makes me think of Tex Avery [cartoon] characters who keep running in thin air," she declared. Duflot, once seen as a presidential protégée, added: "I have made the same journey as millions of French people: I voted Hollande; I believed in him and was disappointed."

The French left are a fractious and fragmented bunch. Former president François Mitterrand is widely credited with saving the modern Socialist party, brought to near extinction in 1969 by the inability of factions to agree on common objectives. Mitterrand did so with an iron fist and famously stony glare.

Hollande is no Mitterrand, preferring a more collegiate and consensual approach. While the problems France faces are not of his making, critics say he has failed to show the necessary leadership to inspire confidence, or as L'Express announced: "Zero growth, plummeting public deficit, rising employment ... Hollande paralysed."

Sylvain Courage, editor-in-chief at Le Nouvel Observateur, said Hollande was a good technocrat, but victim of his own political "amateurism" and failure to communicate with the French people. "Hollande promised things he could not deliver," he said. "He was relying on a global economic turnaround that would take France with it. Somewhat cynically, he hoped he could trick people into thinking that he had turned things around. This is a rather amateur, immature attitude.

"It's true that it would only take 1.5% growth for France to stop destroying jobs and create employment, which isn't enormous, but with growth at 0.5%, it's not happening. That he kept making multiple statements saying it would happen, when it hasn't, has made him seem ridiculous."

Courage added: "The Socialists came to power without being entirely clear about their doctrine and were made up of economic liberals, statists, Keynesians and others all in the same party. Now we see a whole bunch of them have abandoned him."

Madani Cheurfa of the centre for political research at the prestigious university Sciences Po, says the sense of crisis has been exacerbated by in-party squabbling that makes it appear as if the government has taken its eye off the ball. "The quarrels are not even between parties but within them, while the French wait for things to change," he said. "So every time the government announces even a major reform, it seems a side issue; that instead of addressing the debt or that kind of major problem, they are going about with eyes closed."

Prime minister Valls, brought in after the party's disastrous showing in the European elections in May, is a divisive figure. Some see this New Labour-style economic liberal as the only man who can save Hollande. Others see him as a threat to the pluralist left coalition.

"The only chance for the government to restore its image is with Manuel Valls ... he needs to open a new chapter and say 'it's a new start'," said Emmanuel Rivière of pollsters TNS-Sofres. "If the results are good by mid-2015, he can say 'it's down to our policies'. But it has to happen before the spring of 2016 [12 months before the presidential election]. After that it's too late."

Rivière added: "It would be easier if there was a proper, strong opposition in France promising rightwing policies. This would make those on the left realise that they prefer a leftwing government."

Analysts also warn of what Cheurfa describes as "the Front National hiding in the foliage" waiting to pick up disaffected swing voters. Recent polls suggest that the second round of the 2017 presidential election would be contested between an opposition centre-right UMP candidate versus the far right's Marine Le Pen.

All agree Hollande has little room for manoeuvre, with German chancellor Angela Merkel breathing down his neck to reduce France's public spending. "Hollande knows what has to be done, but it's not popular and the price is high," says Cheurfa, quoting European commission president Jean-Claude Juncker: "We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it."

Courage agrees that Hollande is in a political and economic cul-de-sac created by Brussels and the global economic crisis: "He's going to Brussels to say he won't keep his budgetary promises, but he can't raise taxes and he must make cuts, which isn't popular."

Courage believes la rentrée will be hot for Hollande but not necessarily incendiary, even given the propensity among politicians and public for the dramatic: "The French are anxious, anguished, pessimistic ... but not necessarily ready for revolution."

THE PRESIDENT'S CHALLENGES

• Budget deficit Telling Angela Merkel that France will not meet its obligation to reduce its public deficit to 3% of GDP by 2015 – it is likely to be nearer 4% – is going to be difficult. The EU has already given France two chances to meet this target but is running out of patience.
• Social security Hollande's "responsibility pact" was designed to reduce social security charges levied against companies in return for job creation. It was launched as a surefire way of giving the economy a kick by making French business more competitive. However, earlier this month the courts rejected part of this reform – reducing social charges for low-paid employees – as unconstitutional.
• Unemployment Hollande has repeatedly promised to reverse the upward trend of unemployment by the end of 2014. This now looks impossible. The number out of work in France continues to rise and now stands at 10.1% and rising.
• Growth France has been forced to revise its economic growth predictions for 2014 from 1% to 0.5%. The average for all EU states is 1%.